Hello Everyone. Lately, something has been on my mind. I've already shared it on my fashion column, and now I'm going to share it with you. As you can see from my website, I'm a very creative person, and every creative person knows how hard it is to get your work out there, and to gain clientele. I have been an independent fashion designer for over nine years, and I'm still struggling to gain clientele. It can be very frustrating, and it is also frustrating when those "potential clients" try to criticize your work. No matter what creative genre (fashion, art, music, dance, poetry, etc.), for some reason people feel to tear artists down, and feel like we are not worthy of the price of our talents!

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So, I have some "suggestions" about supporting creatives, and I hope you will listen:

Don't Ask for Something If You Cannot Afford It!
- I cannot stand when someone asks for my services, only to get upset because my prices do not fit within their budget! When I first started, people would ask for my services, only to get upset because my prices were "too high!" The mistake I made was lowering my prices to please these individuals. It took two other fashion designers to tell me to stop doing this because it was only allowing people to get over on me. These same two designers also gave me some advice, "if you are lowering your prices for these potential clients, then these are not the clients you want." Now, when someone complains about my prices and says they will buy a product from a "certain" store, I simply tell them to go to that certain store.
- I recently made a post on my Facebook page of a drawing I had created. Everyone had given great compliments on the drawing, but one of my "friends" had posted, "you should design my daughter's sweet 16 dress." Now, I already know this person works minimum wage (or below), so I already know she can't afford my prices, so I simply responded with "I'm expensive." Not even a minute later, she responds with, "Oh Lord! Well, I guess we'll try Walmart then. LOL" I was really mad and hurt about this because:
  - Creating a custom dress is not cheap!
  - The person was demanding for me to make this dress instead of asking.
  - With this person saying she will go to Walmart lets me know she was trying to get the dress for free in the first place!
Do Not Complain About My Prices If You Can Afford A Designer Item With No Complaints
- One thing that really bothers me is when someone complains about someone's prices being high, but then turn around and purchase a designer item because of the name! The reason I am so bothered by this is because I make the exact same thing as that brand, but because I'm an independent fashion designer, you feel that you are not worthy of paying my prices. This is also a way of you saying that you will never support me or any other creative person out there!
Please Do Not Tell Us What We Should Design Simply Because YOU Like It!
- There is a reason for me saying this. Any fashion designer knows that no one creates clothing in every design category. There are certain things we happen to fall in to. This is something creative people will notice while in school, but where I'm from, people in my hometown do not understand that, and they feel that because you are a fashion designer that you supposed to CREATE EVERYTHING they see on TV and in stores! People, it doesn't work like that!

I'm saying all of this to say the following:

Please support the creative people around you!
- We need to know that you are here for us, and when we have your support, we can continue to do great things with our talents!
Don't tell us what to create in order to benefit you!
- Please know that although you want to see us make a certain product that's already out, we have our own products that we want to create and sell!
Please stop complaining about our prices!
- If you do not like our prices, you can shop somewhere else that's in your budget!

Thank you for hearing me out. Until Next Time!!